When elected officials do the will of the people who elected them, that’s good government.

Washington’s City Council, during a meeting last week, received a message from residents and business owners along the proposed 15^th Street project corridor. That message: we don’t like the proposed project in its present form. Not one person who spoke at that meeting endorsed the $16 million project prepared by the North Carolina Department of Transportation.

During its meeting Monday, the council acted on the message delivered by its constituents. Councilman Doug Mercer’s motion for the council to go on record opposing the project in its current form and for the city manager to convey the council’s action to DOT was met with an immediate second by Virginia Finnerty, the city’s mayor pro tempore. The motion passed by unanimous vote by the council.

Since this past summer, residents and business owners along the proposed project corridor have expressed their concerns with the project. Their opposition contains several elements. Homeowners said right-of-way acquisition for the proposed project would take some of their land and lower the values of their houses. Business owners said the proposed plan would restrict access to their businesses and take some of their land, reducing parking space. Other said the proposed project would create additional impervious surface, creating more stormwater runoff and worsen an already bad drainage situation.

DOT’s intentions are admirable. DOT spokesmen have said the project’s goal is to reduce the number of vehicles crashes on 15^th Street. Crashes on the western section of the project corridor occur about three times more frequently than crashes on similar roads in other areas of the state, according to DOT figures.

Some speakers at the hearing conducted by the council last week contended the proposed project would create more problems than it would solve. They made it clear they did not want those problems.

Message delivered. Message received. Action taken.